A Toast to Cannes with Coffee and TV

Coffee and TV is a Soho-based visual effects and post production company set up and run by a team of experienced VFX artists. Completing recent projects for ITV, The Sunday Times and Vodafone, it’s been a busy year for the company.

Last week, the team ventured over to Cannes Lions for the first timer as part of the Coffee & TV team for a well-deserved break and below VFX artist, John Trussler AKA Truss, tells us about the trip in his post-Cannes blog piece.

So our first trip to Cannes as the six staff that makes up VFX boutique Coffee and TV has been successfully completed and I'm glad to report that no VFX specialists were harmed in the making – at least not permanently. We've all been before but in different roles and with much bigger organisations where itineraries were full to bursting with client lunches, meetings, dinners and schmoozes.

Having worked harder in the last 18 months than ever before and with all the added pressure of a new start-up we were really looking forward to having a good time as a group in Cannes.

So a beautiful little villa it was up in 'super Cannes', up the twisty roads to an enclave high up on the hills above Cannes where even homing pigeons struggle to return to their roost, the roads are that convoluted.

A super Cannes super villa fitted out by an interior designer who's clearly never been within 100 miles of an IKEA; exquisite furniture and fittings at every turn. It had the obligatory pool and the most epic poolside bar replete with barbeque, fridge, deep fat fryers(?) and the most excellent Keff speakers known to man. I felt like a superstar rapper for the first hour.

Anna, one of our loveliest clients was also in our travelling party, mostly for her sparkling personality but also, I think, to force us to actually go out and leave the villa at least once.

And so, first stop on a beautiful Wednesday evening was a couple of bottles of rosé at Le Martinez. There's something about palm trees moving gently in the breeze, good chat and good wine that makes the world so much better so very quickly. There's also something about being in Cannes for the first time under entirely your own steam paid for purely by the work that you and your fellow cohorts have done together that is deeply satisfying.

So the rosé tinted specs were already working. Then off to the Rushes party which for all the glamour, sand, rosé and funky tunes was like Soho by sea, in a lovely way. Why couldn't post production have naturally sprung up in Cannes rather than Soho? If we could do Cannes every Friday after work I'd die happy… and early.

Thursday was a slow start and gentle recovery helped by the super pool before the one official bit of business we had to attend to see if our friend Bouha would win Best Music Video at the Young Director Award. It was interesting to see so many great ideas on screen in such a short time – great stuff. Then England played. How I wished I was French.

And then, alas, home. How is it than you can leave Cannes both more tanned and quite pale at the same time? Until next year. Hopefully...